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The North Korean Puzzle

President Park Geun-hye of South Korea and President Xi Jinping of China showed no sense of urgency in tackling the North Korean nuclear issue when they met last week in Seoul, even as analysts keep warning that North Korea is preparing to conduct its fourth nuclear test.

Ms. Park and Mr. Xi said the “two countries reaffirm their firm opposition to the development of nuclear weapons on the Korean Peninsula” and reiterated the need to resume the six-party talks — involving North Korea, South Korea, China, the United States, Japan and Russia — to end the North’s nuclear program. The talks have been suspended since 2009. But there was no sign that anything more concrete came of the meeting. (Some worry that Mr. Xi’s five meetings with Ms. Park since he came to office last year is in part an effort to drive a wedge between South Korea and the United States. But Ms. Park is unlikely to be swayed.)

Ms. Park insists that South Korea will attend the talks only after North Korea commits to denuclearization. She raised the hurdle to the resumption of dialogue in March when she chose to deliver a speech in Dresden, Germany, on her government’s vision of Korean unification — which means unification under Seoul’s auspices.

Her stance is a more overt departure from that of her predecessors, who did not openly threaten North Korean integrity. President Lee Myung-bak, for instance, proposed the denuclearization of North Korea in exchange for security assurance, normalization of relations and economic assistance. For his part, Mr. Xi is pushing for resumption of the talks but considers denuclearization as a long-term goal and will not support a forced unification.

Meanwhile, North Korea continues to produce more nuclear materials. China should keep pressing the North to curb its nuclear activities, and all parties should try to find a way to return to negotiations.

A version of this editorial appears in print on July 12, 2014, in The International New York Times. Today's Paper|Subscribe